by New Year's Day in 1938, the defenders of the convent were dead. The Civil Governor's Building fell on January 3, but Rey d'Harcourt fought on; Ernest Hemingway was present at its fall. The attackers and the defenders were on different stories of the building and fired at each other through holes in the floors. The defenders now had no water, few medical supplies and little food. Their defenses were piles of ruins, but they continued to hold out. The Nationalist advances stalled because of the weather, and finally, on 8 January Rey d'Harcourt surrendered with Anselmo Polanco, the Bishop of Teruel, at his side. Teruel had fallen to the Republicans. The Republicans, in one of their last acts of the war, killed Rey d'Harcourt and the bishop, along with 41 other prisoners in February 1939. After Rey d'Harcourt's surrender, the civilian population of Teruel was evacuated, and the Republicans became the besieged and the Nationalists the besiegers. Nationalist counteroffensive After Rey d'Harcourt's surrender, the Nationalist buildup began to tell on the Republican forces. With the weather clearing, the Nationalists started a new advance on 17 January 1938. Two days later, the Republican leadership finally gave up its scruples about the Battle of Teruel being an all-Spanish operation and ordered the International Brigades to join the struggle. Many of the units had been in the area but in reserve. Celebrities and politicians meanwhile entertained and visited the units. The US communist-sympathising singer Paul Robeson sang for them on Christmas Eve with a repertoire that included L'Internationale and ended with Ol' Man River. Future British Prime Minister Clement Attlee, the left-wing Labour politician Ellen Wilkinson and future Labour government official and diplomat Philip Noel-Baker visited a British unit. Both high commands were now in heated trains near the battlefield and directing their troops in the final part of the battle. Slowly but surely, the Nationalists advanced, and the La Muela heights fell to them. The Republican forces launched fierce counterattacks on 25 January and the next two days, but gains were temporary. Finally, on 7 February, the Nationalists attacked north of Teruel. That was a weak area since most Republican forces had been concentrated to the south around Teruel itself. A massive cavalry charge, one of the last in the history of warfare (there were one or two exceptions near the Caspian Sea during World War II), broke the Republican defenses